David Nalbandian wants to return to Queen's next year despite being disqualified in final for injuring line judge

David Nalbandian hopes to return to Queen's next summer despite being disqualified from Sunday's final for an ill-tempered kick that bloodied a line judge's shin and could leave the Argentinian up to £43,000 out of pocket.
 
In the wars: David Nalbandian took his anger out on an advertising hoarding when flew up and cut the leg of the line judge Photo: GETTY IMAGES


Nalbandian won the first set of his AEGON Championships final at Queen's but lost his temper in the second set after being broken by opponent Marin Cilic.

After missing a lunging forehand Nalbandian kicked an advertising hoarding in front of the chair of line judge Andrew McDougall.

The hoarding flew off its hinges and struck McDougall in the shin, causing an inch-long gash from which blood started to seep.

Nalbandian was disqualified after being deemed guilty of unsportsmanlike conduct and he suffered further pain when he had his £36,500 prize money withdrawn and heard he could be hit with a £6,400 fine.

Yet despite the incident, Nalbandian hopes to return to the Wimbledon warm-up event next year.


"This incident doesn't mean that I'm not going to come back," Nalbandian said. "It doesn't matter. I really feel good at this tournament.

"The tournament director is great to me and I like it. This is a bad situation for everybody and I really apologise for that but it doesn't mean anything to next year."

The 6,000-strong crowd sided with Nalbandian straight after the incident, many of them unaware the kick had caused such damage to the left leg of McDougall, who needed treatment for the injury.

Tournament director Chris Kermode stopped short of saying the 10th seed would definitely be allowed back, but conceded banning the player would be highly unlikely.

"Look, mistakes happen," he said. "I haven't really thought about next year, but you can ask me again in a couple of weeks

"There was no way he intended to do that. It would be foolish to say he's not welcome back to this tournament.

"The tennis he's played this week has been phenomenal and the crowd like him.

"You could tell by the crowd that they wanted him to play, so, you have to forgive these things and move on."

 

O'Brien eases through

(UKPA)

British number two Katie O'Brien joined Elena Baltacha in the second round of the Australian Open after a straight sets win over Patricia Mayr.

The Hull-born 23-year-old won 6-3 6-3 to progress past the first round of a grand slam for just the second time in her career.

O'Brien's best ever result at a major was reaching the second round at Wimbledon in 2007 and a confident display, against a player ranked three places behind her in 90th, ensured she would at least match that.

A difficult task, however, awaits in the next round where she will play eighth seed Jelena Jankovic.

O'Brien quickly found her stride, breaking her Austrian opponent in the fifth game to go 3-2 ahead and then with Mayr serving to stay in the set broke again to take the advantage.

Mayr broke early in the second set, but from there the Austrian's serve let her down. O'Brien pounced on the opportunity and broke on three consecutive occasions to surge ahead before wrapping up the match when Mayr dumped a forehand into the net.

Copyright © 2010 The Press Association. All rights reserved.

Australian Open 2010: Andy Murray happy with first round display

Andy Murray was satisfied with his performance as he brushed aside South African Kevin Anderson to reach the second round at the Australian Open despite the fifth seed struggling with his serve.

Andy Murray claimed a 6-1, 6-1, 6-2 win over the qualifier and despite his struggles the Scot had the measure of Anderson's usually reliable serve and broke eight times during the match to seal an easy win.

"I got here 10 days earlier than I've done in the last three years," said Murray. "I feel good and I think that match proved it [but I'd like to have served bit better."

Murray faulted with 65 per cent of his first serves, which was a concern, and he will have to improve on that later in the tournament. However, Anderson could not hold on to his serve which was broken eight times.

"He didn't get broken in the whole of qualifying," Murray added. "He's 6ft 8in and it was a tough first round for me, so I was a bit nervous at the start but got off to a good start and broke him straightaway."

With strong support from the Melbourne Park crowds, Murray is optimistic he can have a good run in the season's opening grand slam.

Discussing the crowd's backing for him, Murray said: "I've never done that well (at the Australian Open) but hopefully I can go a little better this year and hopefully it will make the difference."

Kirilenko tells boyfriend: 'Now go beat Federer'

Julian Linden

MELBOURNE

MELBOURNE (Reuters) - Maria Kirilenko and her boyfriend Igor Andreev wanted to start 2010 with a bang.

Sports

After the Russian pulled off the biggest win of her career by beating Maria Sharapova 7-6 3-6 6-4 on the opening day of the Australian Open, she now expects Andreev to make some noise against Roger Federer Tuesday.

"Before the matches he said that we can start the year loud (with a big upset)," she told a news conference.

"And I have already started the year loud, I think. So now it's his turn. Of course, it's going to be tough, but in the first round you never know what's gonna happen."

Kirilenko had beaten her good friend Sharapova once before, at Beijing in 2005, but Monday's unexpected win was all the sweeter because it was at a grand slam.

The pair won a doubles title together at Birmingham in 2005 when they were teenagers but while Sharapova's career has gone from strength to strength, Kirilenko's has stalled.

She has won five WTA Tour titles but her best result at a grand slam was reaching the fourth round at Melbourne Park in 2008.

Kirilenko reached a career high ranking of 18 that year but has slipped to 58 after experiencing knee problems in 2009.

"I had a knee problem last year, actually here in Australia," she said. "I was not so good and after Wimbledon, I started to get some treatment.

"Since then, I've had a lot less pain. For example, today I played three-and-a-half hours and I didn't have any pain. And I was moving quite good, I think."

(Editing by Peter Rutherford)

Serena Williams says her knee is OK and she's all set to defend Australian Open title

By Dennis Passa (CP) – 1 hour ago

MELBOURNE, Australia — Serena Williams says her left knee is just fine and it won't keep her from playing both singles and doubles at the Australian Open.

The defending champion said Saturday that although her knee bothered her for much of the Sydney International final the previous night, the injury wasn't serious and it wasn't the reason for her 6-3, 6-2 loss to Elena Dementieva.

"The knee is much better," Williams said. "It was good for me to get all those matches in. So it was good."

She said the pain, which she only described as "definitely not ligament" related, hadn't hampered her preparation for the season's first major.

"Absolutely not," she said. "If anything, it helped. I played a lot of matches in a row, back to back. I had a long three-set match. But that was good preparation for me because I do plan on playing both singles and doubles here."

Williams said Olympic champion Dementieva played a strong match.

"I think Elena played well. She always plays me well ... she played amazing," Williams said. "It's very comforting to know that I wasn't at my best on that particular match. What athlete really is at 100 per cent every time? Probably never."

Williams said she cancelled a practice session Saturday because she wanted some rest, and she'd be ready for her first-round match at Melbourne Park against Poland's Urszula Radwanska on Tuesday.

"Don't want to push it, go too far," she said of the cancelled session. "Definitely want to do the best I can obviously, but also want to pace myself. Hopefully I can play seven singles rounds and six doubles rounds."

Urszula Radwanksa is the younger sister of Agnieszka Radwanska. Williams is the younger of the two Williams sisters on the circuit - Venus is 29, Serena 28.

"I've played her before at Wimbledon, so she's a tough cookie ... and she's definitely no pushover," Williams said of Radwanska. "She's a younger sister, and younger sisters always want to play really hard and really tough. I know that for a fact."

Whatever lightheartedness Williams had in her voice about sibling rivalries disappeared when she was asked about the U.S. Open last year. A profanity-laced, finger-pointing tantrum directed at a line judge in a semifinal loss to Kim Clijsters cost Williams a record fine of US$82,500.

She also faces suspension from the U.S. Open if she has any serious outbursts at a major in the next two years.

Williams has spoken only briefly about the episode since arriving in Australia more than a week ago, and has let everyone know she doesn't really want to talk about it.

So she didn't take kindly to this question from an Australian journalist: "Last time we saw you in a Grand Slam, there was that little incident in New York. How is your anger management coming along?"

"Was it anger management, do you think?" Williams replied, obviously perturbed. "How is your writing coming along?"

When the journalist replied: "Just fine, thank you," Williams said: "Great. Ditto, kiddo."

Copyright © 2010 The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.